Teething.

Title: TeethingAuthor: MexicanAlibiPosted: 04-11-2004Email: cool_slayerchick@hotmail.comRating: PGCategory: LightContent: C/ASummary: Angel and Cordy grow closer, as Baby!Connor slowly munches his way through Angel’s hair products.Spoilers: Post-Connor birth.Disclaimer: The characters in the Angelverse were created by Joss Whedon & David Greenwalt. No infringement is intended, no profit is made.Distribution: Notes: There aren’t enough baby!Connor fics out there, and certainly not enough from his point of view. I’d write more in the notes, but I really have to post this now because IhaveGOTtopeereallyreallybadly… (not that you wanted to know, of course.)Feedback: Thanks/Dedication:

Teething wasn’t easy, and Connor was having a hell of a time.

Mainly, it was his cuddly toys that suffered his wrath. Connor’s first tooth had broken through a few days ago, and coincidentally he had begun chewing on anything and everything he could get his tiny baby hands on.

Most of his toys were now beyond repair. Innumerable pages from several generic demonology books had been chewed clean through, and perhaps strangest of all, Connor had seemingly developed a taste for petroleum-based hair products.

That just couldn’t be healthy.

A tube of Daddy’s hair gel lay, useless and chewed-up in the wastepaper bin, with baby-teeth marks all over it. Connor, apparently not bothered by the incident, had been coughing up Vaseline all morning.

In fact, Connor thought it had tasted kinda nice. He licked his lips in memory, as he lay one his back, wrapped up warm in a wicker Moses basket in the centre of Daddy’s bed. The woman – the one with the nice, big pillows – was cooing softly to him from across the room, keeping him mildly entertained. He liked that woman.

Partly because she always smelled nice, and partly because she was so darned entertaining, but mostly it was because… well, who didn’t like big pillows? Even Daddy liked to stare at them, and Daddy didn’t really like anything except playing with Connor and drinking that red stuff in the fridge.

For some reason though, the nice woman never caught either of them staring. Connor just figured she was too busy being nice to actually notice anything like that.

Connor had decided, quite some time ago, that he didn’t like not being noticed. In fact he noted that today the nice lady’s attention had not been entirely focused on him, as she investigated the contents of Daddy’s wardrobe with a pained expression.

Connor grew very annoyed. Well, damn.

What was a baby to do? He kicked his feet out a couple of times, but found the novelty of being able to move your legs wore off quite quickly. He wanted his gums to stop hurting. He wanted entertainment. He wanted the lady with the big pillows to play with him.

He wanted something other than hair gel to eat for breakfast. Connor opened his mouth and let out an ungodly, attention-seeking wail, and the nice lady leapt to his aid, scooping him up in her arms to hold him against her ample chest.

Yeah. That was more like it, thank you.

As if on cue, Daddy came careening around the door that led into the bathroom, clutching a bag of frozen peas in one hand and a plastic yellow bath-duck in the other. This kind of weird Daddy behaviour was not uncommon. Connor knew from experience that even the slightest noise of discomfort meant he could get Daddy’s undivided attention for as long as he wanted.

“What happened?” Daddy said, applying the frozen peas a large bruise on his forehead, “Why is Connor crying? Is he okay?”

Connor instantly stopped yelling. He was nestled snugly against the nice lady’s pillows, and now he had two people play with. Sweet.

“Relax, Superdad. Baby is fine, aren’t you?” The lady cooed, in that musical baby-lilt she seemed to reserve only for playtime, “But what happened to Daddy? Daddy’s putting ice on his head and Aunt Cordy wants to know why, doesn’t she? Yes, she does.”

Connor blinked at the nice woman. Who was Aunt Cordy? The nice lady certainly didn’t look like she was an Aunt Cordy. She looked like a, a… what was the word? Connor screwed his little face up in disgust. He should know this!

Daddy shuffled forwards, matching her baby voice, “Because Daddy stood on a puddle of baby-sized Vaseline puke as he was getting out of bed this morning, and slid across the floor ’til the nice wall decided to stop him. Didn’t he, Connor?”

Yes, Connor wanted to say, he certainly did. Daddy grimaced and waved the plastic duck in front of Connor, who obligingly accepted it and shoved it straight into his mouth. He had chewed through most of his toys, but the duck was resilient. He was still working on the duck.

The lady looked concerned, “Should baby-waby still be chewing things?”

“Yes, baby-waby should. He *is* teething.”

“… still?”

“This is only his first tooth, Cordy. He’s going to keep on gnawing things for weeks.”

Connor stopped chewing and glared at Daddy. What did he mean, ‘first tooth’? There was more than one? You mean, he had to go through this again? Angrily, he chewed harder, causing the small plastic toy to bear the brunt of his resentment.

This duck was going to get it. Chompchompchomp.

Daddy cleared his throat and shuffled closer.

“Cordelia?” he said, and Connor watched with marked interest. ‘Cordelia’ was a big word. It took a couple of moments for Connor to realise Daddy was talking to the lady again.

Strange, Connor thought, because she didn’t look like a ‘Cordelia’.

The lady shifted Connor’s weight in her arms.

“What?”

Daddy threw the bag of frozen peas into the bin to rest along with the half-eaten hair gel, and then edged towards the lady. He looked like he was going to say something, but then he didn’t. He just stood there for a moment, letting his mouth open and close a couple of times whilst no noise came out. Connor kept chewing, thinking really hard.

Why couldn’t he remember the lady’s real name?

“Cordy…” Daddy said again. He leant a little closer towards her, his face inches away from hers, but still he found nothing else to say, so he just whispered “Cordy” again.

The lady lifted her head and suddenly, all at once, she seemed to understand what he was trying to say. Eyes fluttered closed, and their attention on Connor seemed to wane almost completely as their lips brushed together.

He continued chewing violently on his bath toy, frustrated that he couldn’t remember the nice woman’s name, even though it was on the tip of his tongue! As Daddy and the lady moved a little closer, sighing into each other and clearly doing one of those weird grown-up things that he just didn’t want to know about, Connor remembered.

Triumphantly, he pulled the plastic duck out of his mouth and flung it to the floor, demanding attention.

“Mama!” He proclaimed loudly, shaking his arms. Yes! That was her name! It was so obvious!!